---
title: Once upon a time there lived in Japan a rat and his wife who came of… — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time there lived in Japan a rat and his wife who came of an old and noble race, and had one daughter, the loveliest girl in all the rat world. Who acts: wife. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 17, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics o
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 17, sentence 29

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Once upon a time there lived in Japan a rat and his wife who came of an old and noble race, and had one daughter, the loveliest girl in all the rat world.

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**Who acts:** wife · **What happens:** live, come, have · **To what, where:** rat, Japan, one daughter

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 17. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wife), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg3282:17:29
# text = Once upon a time there lived in Japan a rat and his wife who came of an old and noble race, and had one daughter, the loveliest girl in all the rat world.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	6	advmod	_	_
2	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
5	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	6	advmod	_	_
6	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	Japan	Japan	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	rat	rat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
12	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	conj	_	_
14	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	15	nsubj	_	_
15	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	acl:relcl	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
17	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
18	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	noble	noble	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	conj	_	_
21	race	race	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
24	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
25	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	26	nummod	_	_
26	daughter	daughter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
29	loveliest	lovely	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	30	amod	_	_
30	girl	girl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	appos	_	_
31	in	in	ADP	IN	_	35	case	_	_
32	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	35	det:predet	_	_
33	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	35	det	_	_
34	rat	rat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	35	compound	_	_
35	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	30	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **live** | past |  | a rat and Japan's wife |  | Japan; there | time | once *property* | vn lodge-46 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in japan=Location |
| 2 | **come** | past | Japan's wife |  |  |  |  | of a old race | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme of race=Initial\_Location |
| 3 | **have** | past |  | one daughter |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent daughter=Patient |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Text:** «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3282 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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